This interview sees us return to speak to the very lovely Olivia Lynn. We have a policy here at Rock the Joint Magazine that said from day 1 we would support new artists that we really liked in the hope that they would make it through the noise and be headlining those arenas one day. We came across Olivia during the time she released a single called “Ain’t it a Shame,” which we enjoyed, and we have followed her ever since (she also does impressive support for mental health that we hold close to us here as well). Then, just after she released her best single yet, “Red,” she disappeared! After a year off our radar, she popped up again with the announcement of her first album and a new single to herald it called “Open” that saw her storm back for 2025.
We owed it to the wider mission to find out where she had been and what was happening next; read on and find out how she is back better than ever in 2025.
Olivia…We spoke to you last when “Ain’t That a Shame” came out in 2022. This was a time when things were all exciting, singles were being released and plans for world domination were in place—you were the ultimate busy bee. But then post “Red,” you suddenly dropped off the map and it was beach, bikini and disappearance!
Olivia: In all honesty, that about sums it up. I was in the hot seat in the 2021/22 era and at that point I had a management company as well and i was loving being so busy and all the attention. But then I slowly started to have a few disagreements with my manager and I came to the conclusion that it wasn’t working anymore. In life it just happens; we outgrow people sometimes. Remember that when I started, I was 15 years old, very young and there was a lot going on and I’d changed during those years. After “Red” came out, I did decide to take a step away, and when I did that, I had been doing so much for three years straight, and it was time to find time for me. At that point I wanted to go and do something and say that I’d done it. I could say that I’d released music and done these gigs, but I’d never performed abroad on a contract job. I’d just broken up with my boyfriend after a long-term relationship, and I felt that I needed to get out of the UK and find a fresh me, a new mindset. I applied to some cruise jobs and things like that and was offered one, but I decided on a job in Spain as a vocalist for a contract. I then went into radio silence. I have to note that my mom plays a huge part in my social media; she keeps me on it and she is basically my manager now. Pre-Spain, she was telling me to post this or that-on my case! But when I was in Spain, she couldn’t do that anymore. Also, I was singing every day, literally six days a week, so I did go radio silent. However, I am really glad because I can come back with a bang.
We evolve musically, as in life you become many different people. When we talk to blues artists (Shirley King in particular), they often note how, as we live our lives, songwriting matures as it takes on our personal stories. For example, the more powerful songs are often those that reflect on the love that we lost and still miss, rather than the one we have. “Red,” we feel at the magazine, is the best song Olivia has done, as a general comment. “Red” draws on angst really well.
Olivia: I agree. It becomes easier to draw on anger and sadness when you have had something horrible happen to you. You can take it as a blessing or a curse, but I would also agree with you all and feel that “Red” is probably my best track. As a songwriter, I do find it hard to beat that track. I constantly work on new music and I have a lot of songs that I can’t wait to release but nothing really compares to “I saw Red.” I was so angry at the time when I wrote that song, and I didn’t give a fuck. As I’ve gotten older and taken a step back, I do care. I love being an empathetic person and thinking of others, but… I also want it to be like at the start when I was making music for the love of it. I now take what people think with a pinch of salt. I will take criticism, and I have been doing this my whole life—but that mindset when I released an angry, punchy song which may not be in the guidelines of what country pop is… and I have heard all about how a song doesn’t fit what someone else thinks I should be doing – but I never feel there has to be a mold you can’t slip out of. For me, country writing is storytelling.
Look at Dolly Parton with the Appalachian Tales.
Olivia: Exactly, and sometimes you get the emotion down lyrically and you can read it as a poem.
Look at how Miley Cyrus is such a musical chameleon who can deliver a great rock album, can deliver a country album and work with Billy Idol or Dolly Parton and I think she is doing jazz now. With Miley, she just says this is what she is doing and delivers it, no apology.
Olivia: Yes, never put in the mind of the audience that they may not like what you are about to do! Don’t let them think that now is the time to wander off for a drink; now is the time to listen to you!
And where is Olivia now in the songwriting journey? In “Ain’t that a shame” she was ‘shaking her ass for all the world to see’—but maybe that is not the case now?! Is the new album a continuation from those early songs or a complete break?
Olivia: Definitely not singing about that anymore! But the new songs are a mixture of old and new. There are songs that look back at my past self, the pre-Spain me, and that is still a part of who I am. But there is also the new era of me, post-Spain, being a mom. These are more stripped-back songs and a different type of country song that I can’t wait to share and am very excited about. Each song sounds so different; I am confidently writing again, and I have the album in place. It is a case of recording and releasing. But the immediate future is the new single on May 16. It’s ready now, produced and mastered, and I can’t wait. It was written a while ago, maybe 2 years ago, and I haven’t had the window to release it, as my old manager didn’t like the newer style of writing I was doing, but I am writing for me now. My dad loves it, and I got to play it live recently in April, and it went down so well. I’m getting artwork for the cover as well this week.
The Passerines we spoke to very recently for the magazine and their song “Shot that Fucker Dead” (great song) draws so well on angst to deliver the story and the emotion. If Olivia was given two minutes with herself around the time of “Ain’t it a Shame” being released, what advice would she give to herself?
Olivia: I would be telling her to write more music; don’t stop. And when you feel something write it down and use it because “I Saw Red” came from that. I would actually be asking her advice on how she wrote those songs. How did she break it down and return me to that point? I want that brash confidence in myself again. She was so young, but she knew exactly what she wanted and had so much confidence. But, don’t get me wrong, I am still driven, and I know what I want. I will get there; I’m not stopping.
We marked you out as an upcoming artist to watch, and then you bloody well disappeared.
Olivia: I know… I just think back then I was so proud of her as she was going through so much. There was the stress with management and having to do certain things. I was not in a happy place. I was controlled, not allowed to do things as I wanted. But I’m proud of her, and I would love to be able to sit and talk to her.
Lyrics are a wider form of poetry, of course. Sometimes lyrics and poetry are ways of therapy we think to work through emotions and set things right in our heads. Songs can be ways to share emotions with people.
Olivia: All of my songs are drawn from personal experience, all of them. I suppose I could write from an outside perspective, but it would be harder. I have had so much happen to me in my 19 years, so many upsets and angry moments. So many positive moments and happy times, but also betrayals. There has been such supportive family, not always supportive friends; there has been bullying and ridicule to get through. But I use all of this and process it musically. I write songs about things in my life from years ago as you process it and deal with underlying trauma.
It is also so relatable and real for others.
Olivia: 100%. I can get up on a stage and say that I wrote this song from the bottom of my heart; this happened to me, and this is what came out. “I Saw Red”—I was feeling so hurt; I was so pissed off because I was a fool and he had treated me like that after so much. I was so angry that I put it into words and every time I get up on stage and do that song, I say, ‘this is a song that if you have ever been betrayed and felt like smashing some shit up, then this is the song for you!’ You can be hoovering your bedroom or driving your car, and you just want to scream; this song is for you. It is so much more personable when you can say it is what happened to you.
“I know you think that I’m going insane, But your just jealous I beat you at your game. Your egos boosted off on one trashy girl, Saw my replacement I began to hurl… (From “Red” – Written By Olivia Lynn, Arranged & Composed by Mike Zimean)
From the buzz around the magazine here, “Red” is really banging! The teenagers around love it and have it on playlists. But away from anger, could motherhood appear in your future lyrics?
Olivia: I have started writing a song about motherhood. Actually, I have written two, but they are very unfinished and I am not happy with them yet. One is very positive about how much I love my daughter; I can’t imagine life without her and so forth. Then the other song is me grieving the person I was before becoming a mother. Let me say I love being a mother; she is my everything. One of my greatest achievements is being a mom. But at the same time I grieve a past self as I went from this 16-year-old writing songs about shaking her ass and wearing these flamboyant outfits to being a mom. That is something I want to write about, as you both give all this love to your child, but you still need enough left to be yourself for your dreams. I want to capture that. I smile as I talk about her, but I can also grieve for what I was and how I miss that.
You become something else. The feminist line is that too often women are identified through someone else: they are this person’s daughter, this person’s girlfriend/wife and then this person’s mother. But there is the person behind all that too.
Olivia: That is what I wanted to capture. I want the music to keep going forward. I do post the pictures of my daughter but selfishly she doesn’t appear on my grid much. I still have my dream. I am still only 19. I am not just a mom; that is not who I am. I am a mom; that is factual, but before that I was Olivia, and I was a singer too before I was a mom. I am Olivia, the country singer; that is how I wish to be referred to. I don’t think I am alone in wanting that. If I was a manager or agent, and I looked at the grid of pictures of baby, baby, mom, mom, then what does that portray? Nothing about my music—it would seem like I have no drive.
Have you found yourself moving with the country image side of things musically? Do you see the image side of music changing for you as well? Is there a greater pressure image-wise for female artists in country, do you think?
Olivia: I think I have largely escaped the image pressures musically. I’m comfortable in my own skin and have been proud of who I am and how I look. I am of the ‘if you have got it, flaunt it’ thinking (as my mum would say), but there is a massive difference between that and using it to captivate a certain clickbait in social media. But back then, when you spoke to me around “Ain’t it a Shame,” my then-partner was very controlling, telling me what to wear or not wear. My mom would tell me not to listen to him: my body, my choice. Now I am older, I still love my figure, and I’m still a teenager. I will still dress as I like. I am still who I am. But my manager at the time, she would constantly want me to dress in a certain way, including performing in lingerie at one point. Remember, I was 16 at the time, and my mom was mortified. I wouldn’t do that, then or now.
Brittany Spears’ autobiography, a great read, reads very sadly on this very kind of topic. And lastly, what do we need to know about what is going on with Olivia now?
Olivia: The new single you know about, the album in July, and a range of gigs on the way. I have a full band now—guitarist, bassist, keyboardist, and drummer – so that is amazing.
As Olivia Lynn steps boldly into this next chapter, her music carries with it the scars, strength, and soul of a young artist who has already lived through the industry’s highs and lows. With her new single about to drop, a debut album on the horizon, and a full band backing her vision, 2025 is shaping up to be the year Olivia reclaims her narrative. She’s no longer just one to watch—she’s the voice of resilience, realness, and raw talent in modern country pop.
If this feature struck a chord, why not explore more of what we do? From exclusive interviews to reviews, editorials, poetry, and our own merch—there’s plenty to discover. We put a lot of heart into every piece, and if you’d like to show a little love in return, you can support us with a small donation via the Ko-Fi link below. Every coffee keeps us going—and helps keep the magazine free for all. Thank you!
Stream music from Olivia here
Artist website here
By Mark C Chambers
and
Lorraine Foley
